


The Reunion™

by BabyGenius



Series: A Bat in A White Collar [2]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, White Collar
Genre: A little helping of Angst, An attempt at the very least, Bruce Finds out Jason’s Alive, Can’t you tell, Damian Wayne is mentioned, Dick Grayson is Neal Caffrey, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Humor, I think they’re relatively in character, Idk I tried really hard, Is Still Just Dickface, It’s my second work, It’s the Reunion!, Neal Caffrey is Dick Grayson, No beta we tpyo like men, Reunion, So I’m a veteran tagger, So does Alfred, So it doesn’t really count, Surprise I’m not Dead, The Only Swearword, There’s another Surprise I’m Not Dead Moment, and tim - Freeform, or enbies, or women, somewhat ooc?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-22
Updated: 2020-06-22
Packaged: 2021-03-03 21:13:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24862126
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BabyGenius/pseuds/BabyGenius
Summary: “Don’t worry, B, nothing’s wrong. Actually, I have good news!”Bruce peered at the screen with suspicion (good news could mean a lot of things, some of them ridiculous—“Hey B I found a cat with a bat symbol on its fur!”—or some worrying—“I got a job at the FBI!”). Alfred moved his dusting to nearby so he could hear what this “good news” was.- -Second part of my series A Bat in A White Collar. You might want to read the first one, but it isn’t necessary (though that one has a lot more of White Collar). There is, in fact, another “Surprise I’m Not Dead!” moment, as well as a Batfam reunion.
Relationships: Alfred Pennyworth & Jason Todd, Bruce Wayne & Jason Todd, Dick Grayson & Jason Todd, Tim Drake & Jason Todd
Series: A Bat in A White Collar [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1790395
Comments: 31
Kudos: 353





	The Reunion™

**Author's Note:**

> A’ight, so y’all asked for more and I did it. Tbh the words didn’t flow as well for this one, so I dunno if it’s my best work, but I’m relatively comfy with it. I’ll most likely update this series once a week, give or take a day or two (I’ve been put to work around the house for almost the entire day every day, so bear with me). Also, this one doesn’t have nearly as much White Collar, but it wouldn’t have really fit in the story so I wasn’t gonna force it.  
> Please leave comments below, because without them I wouldn’t have continued this series. If you want more, you’re gonna have to make sure I know it. Even if it’s just one word (“Good!”) or more, (“I loved it!” “This was great!” “This was horrible!”—please don’t do that last one, I’m a sensitive soul, unfortunately). I thrive off of comments! Ngl I almost cried when I saw what a positive reaction my first one got (I didn’t get any comment notifications until the next morning and I opened it expecting there to only be one but Suprise! there were like 10 already).  
> Anyway, Enjoy!

Bruce had just gotten back from patrol. Tim was upstairs in his room (supposedly asleep, but we all know that ain’t true). Alfred was dusting the Batcave and Bruce was going over some information he had discovered on his stakeout about one of the (thankfully few) human trafficking rings in Gotham. The cave was cool, the darkness a comforting presence since he had gotten use to it long ago.

A brightly colored call notification popped up on the Batcomputer’s screen. Bruce notes with slight concern that it was from Dick, so he picked it up quickly. “Yes?”

“Don’t worry, B, nothing’s wrong. Actually, I have good news!”

Bruce peered at the screen with suspicion (good news could mean a lot of things, some of them ridiculous—“Hey B I found a cat with a bat symbol on its fur!”—or some worrying—“I got a job at the FBI!”). Alfred moved his dusting to nearby so he could hear what this “good news” was.

“So, it turns out, someone’s not dead!” Dick reached out of the camera range and pulled someone into it. Bruce made a sharp intake of breath, his eyes widening. He leaned closer to the monitor.

“Is that…?”

“Hey, Bruce,” the man on screen murmured.

“Jason?!”

“Yeah, B. It’s me. I’m not dead, surprise!” Jason gave a halfhearted attempt at jazz hands, his ears tinged red with embarrassment.

“I—how—I don’t—?” Bruce sputtered. Alfred, from behind him, had dropped his feather duster. He quickly recovered, though, and cleared his throat.

“Master Todd? Well, this is certainly good news! I think a family visit is in order, don’t you Master Bruce?”

Bruce only nodded dumbly, still numb and staring at the screen. Jason grimaced and shrugged. “I’ll explain when you get here, don’t worry.”

Dick clapped his hands. “Awesome! Bruce, I expect you to be here within the next two days, I’ll alert my landlord to expect guests. Alfred, I believe you and June will get along swimmingly.”

“We shall see, Master Richard. Expect us by tomorrow evening.” Alfred’s eyes were crinkled in a slight smile. “I look forward to hearing about what you have been up to.”

Dick laughed awkwardly, nervousness clear. “Of course, Alf. See you then!”

Alfred nodded and the call blinked out of existence. The two men sat there, marinating in their thoughts (of course, for Alfred, it seemed as though he were just waiting for Bruce to speak). “He’s alive,” Bruce muttered, his voice raw and full of hope, nearly cracking with emotion. Of course, he wouldn’t completely believe it until he got to New York and saw him in the flesh, but the hope was still there.

Alfred set a hand on Bruce’s shoulder. “Indeed he is, Master Bruce. I shall go alert Master Timothy that we will be leaving at 4:30 on the dot. Be sure to prepare your jet to be ready by then, Master Bruce.”

Bruce nodded before allowing his face to fall into his hands in a rare display of vulnerability. His shoulders shook for a few seconds before he pulled himself back together. Alfred had gone upstairs to talk to Tim, so Bruce quickly finished up the report he had been going over before taking off the cowl and hanging it up. He stood there for a second, digesting the things that had happened in the past few minutes, before steeling himself and heading upstairs.

——

Morning couldn’t have come soon enough. Bruce had been laying in his bed all night thinking, and he still had until the afternoon before they left. It was an impatient waiting game, and however good he had gotten at those while being the Bat, this was a special kind of impatience. It was the impatience of an eagerly awaiting a reunion parent. A parent who had thought part of his world had just…gone. Not vanished, but been destroyed. To have a hope of seeing that piece of his world again? He had to restrain himself from just flying over there right now.

Tim was somewhat confused. He hadn’t known Jason very well (aside from the one fight they had had…which Tim was just now realizing was Jason, and not some rando—though he hadn’t told Bruce about the fight), but he was somewhat worried about how they would get along. He could only hope Dick and Alfred were good mediators (Alfred was, at least, he thought, because of how terrifying the man could be when needed).

——

June had been glad to host the three members of his family coming (which was fortunate, because Dick didn’t think a restaurant would be the best setting for this sort of thing). Damian was being watched by Selina (which Bruce was somewhat wary about, but oh well). All June required was an explanation about what was happening. Besides, she and Jason got on like a house on fire.

Jason had been pacing Dick’s room for nearly half an hour now, periodically wiping sweaty palms on his pantlegs; Dick sketched his facial expressions while he did that and then fleshed the sketch out. He presented it to his brother and got a surprised look in response. “I didn’t know you could draw that well.”

Dick shrugged, somewhat self-consciously. “I needed something to do after leaving the force, and that was it. It was cathartic, and I realized that, with a little practice, I could turn it into something.”

“Forging?” Jason snorted, raising an eyebrow.

Dick grinned and waved a hand. “That’s what they think, at least. A lot of those were jobs for another agency that I quit, so technically they were government sanctioned. Now I’m just working on weeding out corruption like I did in ‘Haven.”

Jason nodded. “Makes sense.” He shot a glance at the clock and sighed in frustration. It was 4:15, and the rest of the Batfamily (Dick’s term) wasn’t set to arrive until five. They say the darkest hour is before the dawn. Or maybe it was the longest hour. Either way, that was true of waiting for things. You’ve waited all that time, and you’re so close to the event, and it seems to inch by slower than the time before that.

The minutes on the clock ticked by at a snail’s pace, but eventually it was 4:59. As the second hand ticked to 59 seconds, the doorbell rang from downstairs. Dick sprung out of his seat and raced downstairs, vaulting over the stair railing and climbing down quickly. June looked at him with mirth in her eyes as she waved him forward. The door opened, and Dick’s face split into a big grin. “Bruce!”

The corners of Bruce’s lips tilted up in what was his version of a grin. “Dick, it’s nice to see you.”

Dick stepped aside to allow the three into the house. June stepped up next to him. “Hello, you three. My name is June, and I’m your hostess for your time here and Richard’s landlady.”

Bruce stepped forward with a hand out. “Nice to meet you, June. Thank you for allowing us use of your home.”

June nodded graciously. “Richard can show you to your rooms and you can make yourselves comfortable.”

Alfred nodded. “Thank you, Ms. Ellington.”

June leveled a stern gaze at him. “None of that Mr. Pennyworth, it’s just June.”

Alfred bowed his head. “As you wish, June. If I am to call you that, however, then I insist on being called Alfred.”

June smiled at him before nodding her head and walking away. Dick drew Tim into a hug. “Nice to see you, Timbo.”

Tim ducked out of it. “Yeah yeah, nice to see you too Big Bird.”

Dick smirked and waved them toward the stairs. “Jason is in my flat, so I’ll take you there first. We were making dinner, so he’s probably finishing it up now.”

Bruce waited hesitantly in front of the door to Dick’s flat. This was it. He was going to see Jason again, after a year of thinking him dead. Dick was next to him, waiting patiently for him to make the first move and open the door. No doubt Jason had heard them coming up and was wondering what was taking them so long.

Bruce reached out a hand and grasped the doorknob, the metal cold under his hands. He took a barely noticeable deep breath and pushed the door open, stepping quickly inside before lifting his head. Jason was in front of him by an island in the middle of the kitchen area, his eyes wide. What if he’s angry with me for letting him die? Bruce wondered. He steeled himself for any kind of reaction he could get.

Alfred moved past him and pulled Jason into a hug. “I’m glad you’re well, Master Jason.”

Jason returned the hug, tucking his head into the nape of Alfred’s neck and saying nothing. Soon the hug was over, and he was left to stare wide-eyed at Bruce once more. Dick cleared his throat. “Dinner will be ready in about ten minutes. Meanwhile, I have something I wanna show Tim and Alfred. Have fun you two,” he said to Jason and Bruce, leading the other two away and to his room.

The two stood there awkwardly for a few minutes, not quite sure of what to say. Bruce opened his mouth but closed it again, seeming to second-guess what he was about to say. He opened his mouth again and managed to blurt out, “Are you okay?” Jason gave him an incredulous look. His ears tinged slightly pink (somewhat uncharacteristic of the famous Batman, he knew). “I only mean, you were dead, and obviously brought back somehow. I don’t know how long ago, but are you doing okay now?”

Normally Bruce was a man of few words, but this occasion required he step a little outside of his comfort zone.

Jason’s face now held a look of understanding as he nodded. “I got back about a year ago, and for a while I wasn’t great. I’m not a hundred percent, but I’m managing.”

Bruce nodded. “Good, that’s good.” He seemed to think about it before asking, “How did Dick find out you were alive?”

Jason grinned, mischief twinkling in his eyes. “I surprised him at work. It was kinda funny, to be honest.”

Bruce’s lips quirked minutely. “I can imagine.” A few more seconds passed and then—“Do you have somewhere to stay? If not then the manor…”

Jason shook his head, inferring what Bruce meant despite him trailing off. “I don’t think that would be best, I still have lapses in control. And, however much I don’t like Replacement, I don’t want to permanently maim him or something. Besides, I have a place here in New York—all the better to annoy Dick with.”

Bruce scowled at the Replacement comment, but let it slide.

Soon, the other three had joined them and dinner was served. Conversation was somewhat stilted in the beginning (“Sooo….what do we think about the weather today?”), but they all eventually managed to work around it and reach a new normal. Jason and Tim didn’t get along fantastically, but they were able to tolerate each other (for the most part). Despite finding a relative new normal, things were still somewhat tense, but they all trusted that would disappear in time.

The time eventually came for them to leave. Bruce pulled Jason into a tight hug, whispering, “I’m glad you’re alive.”

Jason had stiffened, but now he hugged back just as tightly, saying nothing. When Bruce let go, Alfred pulled him into a hug just as tight. “Stay safe, Master Jason, and keep in touch.”

Jason nodded. “I will,” he promised.

Tim just punched him on the shoulder. “Don’t die again.”

Dick sighed, shaking his head and pinching the bridge of his nose. Jason smirked. “Of course not. God forbid I leave Bruce with only you and Dickie-Bird for company.”

The three left and Jason and Dick began cleaning things up. “I think that went pretty well,” Dick broached cautiously.

Jason nodded. “Yeah, I think it did too.”

Dick looked at him with a tender smile…before interrupting the moment by asking, “So what’s this I hear about you living in New York?”

“Oh, well—”

“This had better not be a plan to make my life harder, especially at work—”

**Author's Note:**

> So, how was it? I will say right now that I will accept grammatical corrections and am open to discussion on story choices and stuff, but if I’m given too many suggestions I reserve the right to not use them, because if I spend all of my time obsessing over how to make this better, I’ll go insane. Aside from that, please drop a comment or kudos, they’re the reason I continued this series and the reason I had the energy/motivation to want to continue it!  
> That said, you may have noticed that in this story I used “Dick” instead of “Neal”. The reasoning is simple: this story took place in the Batman universe more than it did in the White Collar universe. The characters that were interacting with him knew him as Dick, first and foremost. Just like how, in the one prior to this, most of the characters in the setting knew him as Neal.  
> If you look at the notes on the series, you’ll see that I have the plans for the next few stories up, so I know roughly what I’m doing for now. I will be accepting ideas (I can’t promise I’ll write them, but I would still let me know if you have any). After all, a few of the story ideas in the series notes came from commenters on my first story.  
> Sorry for the long rambling....


End file.
